Quote:
Originally Posted by Sal
Consider Moultonborough Neck Road. Town spent a small fortune making a paved bike-path (which gets covered with small stones and as a result, bicyclists would rather be on the road).....
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Most of the first completed section of the Moultonborough Pathway, from JoJo's store to the fork just before Trexler's Marina, goes off into the woods well removed from the roadway. When Phase II was done, from Highway Garage Road to Kona Road, there were property use constraints that resulted in the pathway being adjacent to the roadway. Most of that section has a narrow gravel strip separating the paved pathway from the roadway, although the section running up the hill to Kona Road is totally paved, with a paint stripe separating the pathway/bike lane.
The use of a gravel strip to separate the pathway from the roadway was recommended and seemed like a good idea and reasonable at the time. As neck road travelers and users of the pathway have noticed, there are parts of this section of the pathway where sand and stones from the gravel strip migrate over to the pathway pavement, due to heavy rain and also to car tires getting off the roadway pavement and onto the gravel. The worst places are on the hill above Greene's Basin Road and the S-curve south of Sticks and Stones Road.
The state recently has given approval to a plan to retrofit the worst parts of this outer section of the pathway, and work is expected to start within a couple of weeks. In those areas, the roadway and pathway will become contiguous pavement, with two paint stripes separating the uses.